While the speculations of Virat Kohli’s retirement from Test cricket run wild, a clip of veteran Indian batter has started gaining traction on social media where he talks about how testing the longest format of the game can be.
In an video shared by Sky Sports on X (formerly Twitter), Kohli says, “You need to be honest with yourself. I mean, you know test cricket is tough. I mean, even when you’re one of the top teams in the world, or probably the best test team in the world over the last few years. You can still go into a space where you probably don’t want it at certain stages. You feel like five days. Do I want to do this again.”
“So you really need to be absolutely honest with yourself. Are you ready for the hard grind? Are you ready to wake up on day three when things are absolutely stacked up against you, when you know that you are in trouble as a batting unit? Are you going out there to get that 100 or get that 150 for your team. You know it’s gonna be tough. You probably have to do it for five six hours over over a period of two days. Are you strong enough to do that?” Kohli added
Kohli on leaving Indian cricket in hands of youngsters:
In the same video, Kohli says if he had to walk away from the game tomorrow, he would ‘walk away without any regrets’ because everything that he has done since entering Indian cricket has always been for the team.
On leaving the future of Indian cricket in the hands of youngsters, Kohli said, “The reason why I reach out to these guys is because I don’t want them to waste probably months and years of my life that I wasted as a youngster still trying to figure things out when I found out the formula for success and what it means to compete at this level. I want these guys to pick it up early, so that the transition with Indian cricket can be very smooth.”
Notably, multiple reports earlier this week revealed that Kohli had shared his intent with the BCCI to retire from Test cricket, but the Indian cricket board has asked its biggest cricketing star to reconsider. The news of Kohli’s retirement comes days after Indian captain Rohit Sharma announced that he his hanging up his boots in Test cricket.
